 “You
could remove the Fool and Horatio
and not alter much in the way of plot
structures, but you would remove out
surrogates from these plays, for the Fool
and Horatio are the true voices of our
feeling.” Shakespeare: the invention of the
Human. Harold Bloom. (1999) P. 494


F.S.Boas has observed:“Unlike his fellows in other plays, he
is nameless, with no more distinguishing badge
of individuality than plain ‘Fool’. He is scarcely a person, a
unit to be counted. He is a wandering voice--- the voice of
Lear’s conscience, taking outward form in this grotesque yet
wistful figure.” Fool is the only character in the play whose
wit keeps the things warm in the play. His tongue has
undoubtedly the sharper edge.
A. C. Bradley remarks, “Fool is one of Shakespeare’ triumphs
in King Lear adding that without him we will hardly know the
tragedy.” He is also regarded as the “soul of pathos in a
comic masquerade.” In spite of all his importance, he seems
to be outside the play and does not contribute much to
proceed into the story or action of the play. He never affects
the action. Even we do not know his name; age, whether he
is mad or sane.
Other critics study the way in which the Fool
enhances the tragic mood of the play, or his
relationship with Lear. Glena D. Wood (1972) has
observed the ironic juxtaposition between Lear's
actions and the Fool's words. Wood has demonstrated
that the Fool's words and actions precipitate Lear's
growth and at the same time increase both the irony
and the tragic-comic effect in the play.
 In analyzing the rhetoric of the Fool, Toshiko Oyama
(1963) has maintained that through the Fool's use of
logical argumentation in his conversations with Lear,
the Fool increases the ambiguity of the play's events
and thereby heightens the tragic atmosphere and
tension.

 The
fool is a mirror, as the wasteland and
the storm are mirrors, reflecting back at
Lear his own concealed image. He is all
too truly “Lear’s shadow”. The fool was to
reflect and epitomize the folly of the
world around him and neutralize it.
Shakespeare After All


He inverts the natural order (a recurring idea in
the play), as he is entitled by virtue of his stage
license to speak to power with little fear of
consequence but by the time he is in the storm
with Lear he has become an aspect of Lear
himself. ‘The last shall be the first” we see the
Fool enter the hovel before the king, he is called
boy again whereas earlier he was able to call the
King boy. Etc Garber lecture
“Many [that are] first shall be last; and the last
[shall be] first (Matthew 19:30)
 Along
with Kent he is Lear’s wisest
counsellor & most faithful associate.
 Boy actor = Fool & Cordelia
 Provides no full-blown comic relief (think
of porter in Macbeth) does, however,
offer some levity. His songs & crudity
offer a smile rather than a laugh.
 Role of the fool similar to that of the
Greek Chorus: comments & interprets the
action.
 Never
speaks in blank verse; his speech
marks him as an outsider: he uses similie,
proverb, rhyming adages, songs &
sayings, much of which Lear doesn’t fully
hear or grasp. (Lear for most of the play
cannot carry on real dialogue.)

MACDUFF Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed,
That you do lie so late?
PORTER Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second cock, and
drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things.
MACDUFF What three things does drink especially provoke?
PORTER Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery, sir,
it
provokes, and unprovokes: it provokes the desire, but it takes
away the performance. Therefore much drink may be said to
be
an equivocator with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it
sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him and
disheartens
him, makes him stand to and not stand to. In conclusion,
equivocates him in a sleep, and giving him the lie,
leaves him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuL8aWWGUTQ
 Fool
knows how to reduce Lear’s
behaviour to the simplest, most
uncomplicated images of reality, so that
the state of affairs becomes perfectly
obvious. Thus by means of the trivial
simile of the egg which Lear has divided
to give away both halves (the 2 crowns)
he shows how simple is the division and
the abandoning of power (1.4.73)
 Continually
refers to things as being
inverted/upside-down/out of natural
order.
 1.4.76 /1.4.238 / 1.4.243 / 3.2.31
 Many animal images: stress the fact that
men fare no better than animals.
 “Horses are tied by the heads, dogs and
bears by the neck, monkeys by the loins,
and men by the legs” (2.4.7)
A proverbial phrase meaning ‘I’ll play the fool
too”.
 Fool leaves in the middle of the play; i.e noon.
 He is no longer need, he is to be replaced by
Cordelia, who represents not contempt for
mankind’s limitations but hope for redemption.
 His folly can not co-exist in the world with human
cruelty
 He is at the centre of the play: he is an image
(like Tom o’ Bedlam) of helpless and suffering
love; he exerts no influence on the course of
events, and so the course of events passes him
by.

 And
of course remember to discuss the
other fools in the play.